Transcript Origin of Civilization

Civilization
Characteristics and Beginnings
Characteristics of Civilization
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Complexity – (relative term)
Hierarchy of social classes
Permanent governmental institutions
Urbanity
Concentration of political power
Formalized religion
Tax collection, compulsory agencies (army
and police, system of writing
Why Civilization
• Recent phenomenon in human history
• Agricultural Revolution provided the
material foundation for and may have
compelled civilization (irrigation projects)
• Little evidence to explain why people
civilized—protection, coercion.
• Given the time involved—over many
people’s lifetimes—it’s likely that people
were not aware of the change until after the
event
Civilization followed Agriculture
• In present day Greece and Syria, seasonal
farming of lentils and emmer wheat began by
8000 B. C. E.
• Cities like Jericho emerged as seasonal farming
bases
• From earliest times, growers of food were vitally
interested in “life” and how to manipulate it.
• Led to evolution of more formal religious
practices and rituals.
Lentils and Emmer Wheat
Domestication of Animals
• Sheep, Goats, and latter Cows were
domesticated as sources of food and
clothing.
• Later, they were made beasts of burden.
• Farmers and herders became increasingly
specialized.
Mesopotamia: A Cradle of Civ.
Civilization at Sumer
• First described by Archaeologist Samuel Noah
Kramer.
• By 3000 B. C. E., there were urban settlements,
central government, irrigation projects, and
symbolic religion.
• Lower Mesopotamia had fertile soil but also a
serious flooding problem.
• The need, and subsequent ability, to direct
collective human activity in the lower alluvial
plain of the Tigris and Euphrates river likely
made this one birthplace of Civilization.
Sumerian Ascendancy (3000-2000
B. C. E.
• Government and religion was in the hands
of priests who lived in massive ziggurats
• Sophisticated pottery tells not only of the
use of the wheel but artistic specialization
as well.
• A vast trading network emerged with other
peoples in the “Fertile Crescent.”
• Cuneiform writing developed. (tax
registers)
Governmental Institutions
• Sumer was not a country or nation in a modern
sense
• City-State—periodically one of the Sumerian
cities would predominate—Ur was often the
dominant city.
• Each city-state had its own deity—link of religion
w/ patriotism
• Priests gathered the wealth of the city, fed the
gods who gave “life” to the people, and
redistributed the remainder.
• Famine was sign of god’s displeasure.
Ziggurat at Ur (Ca. 2100 B. C. E.)
Major Sumerian Cities
Sumerian Religious pantheon
•
•
•
•
•
An—god of the sky
Enlil—god of wind
Enki—god of the earth
Ninhursaga—goddess of life
These main gods were assisted by their
children—Utu, the sun god, for example.
• Key human activity was to try to discern
and manipulate the will of the gods—
divination.
Akkadian Hegemony
• Trade ties and political ambition led to the
consolidation of power and the creation of the
first “Empire” in recorded history.
• The city of Akkad became the base.
• Under Sargon I (2334-2279 BC), known as the
“Great”, Akkad dominated the Sumerian cities
and its hegemony extended over southern
Mesopotamia as well as parts of Syria, Anatolia,
and Elam (western Iran)
King Sargon ruled for 56 years
Ancient Tribute to Sargon
• Sargon, King of Akkad, through the royal gift of Ishtar was
exalted, and he possessed no foe nor rival. His glory over the
world he poured out. The Sea in the East he crossed, and in the
eleventh year the Country of the West in its full extent his hand
subdued. He united them under one control; he set up his images
in the West; their booty he brought over at his word. Over the
hosts of he world he reigned supreme. Against Kassala he
marched, and he turned Kassala into mounds and heaps of ruins;
he destroyed the land and left not enough for a bird to rest
thereon. Afterward in his old age all the lands revolted against
him, and they besieged him in Akkad; and Sargon went forth to
battle and defeated them; he accomplished their overthrow, and
heir widespreading host he destroyed. Afterward he attacked the
land of Subartu in his might, and they submitted to his arms, and
Sargon settled that revolt, and defeated them; he accomplished
their overthrow, and their widespreading host he destroyed, and
he brought their possessions into Akkad. The soil from the
trenches of Babylon he removed, and the boundaries of Akkad he
made like those of Babylon. But because of the evil which he had
committed, the great lord Marduk was angry, and he destroyed
his people by famine. From the rising of he sun unto the setting
of the sun they opposed him and gave him no rest.
Sumer’s decline
• After the Akkadian hegemony, Sumerian
cities regained their hegemony.
• By 2000 B. C. E., Sumer’s neighbors
coveted its cities and resources.
• Major pattern in history of Middle East is
the invasion of settled areas by vigorous
but more primitive people on the borders.
• Babylonia Amorites overran lower
Mesopotamia by 1900 B. C. E.
Amorite Civilization (1900-1600
• Sumerian kings were considered divine;
Amorites had to justify their usurpation.
• Accomplished this through centralization.
• Various Sumerian cities were brought
under central control by Amorite kings
headquartered at Babylon.
• Political order replaced the chaos of rival
city states. To some degree, people
traded independence for security.
Hammurabi, (r. 1792-1760)
• Considered greatest Amorite king
• Most famous for his code of laws.
Hammurabi’s Code
• By what it regulated and the language it used to
depict the regulation, it tells us much about
Babylonian society.
• It was class based with much wealth and power
concentrated in the hands of the few.
• There was not equality before the law; a crime
against a rich person might lead to the death
penalty; a crime against a poor person was not
considered as severe.
• Crimes against the public order got the death
penalty.
• Women were legally inferior to men but had more
rights than they would possess under Hebraic and
Roman Law.
“Revolutionary” Features in the
Law Code
• The State, not private parties, will
dispense justice.
• Lex talionis – “an eye for an eye” –
replaced “a life for an eye.”
• State regulation of sexuality and family
matters and a public good. (Origin of
“police powers” concept.)
Mesopotamia
• A birthplace of civilization, Mesopotamia
would continue to host a welter of
civilizations and invaders until modern
times.
• The qualitative difference between
Mesopotamian civilization and the
transhumance existence of prior humans
provides data to define the characteristics
of human civilization inductively.